The vast majority of multi-cylinder internal combustion engines sold today utilize a single cylinder block containing a plurality of cylinder bores. Unfortunately, if one of the cylinder bores becomes damaged to the point where it cannot be repaired by sleeving or by other means commonly used for such repairs, the entire cylinder block must be scrapped. And, even when an engine block can be repaired by boring and sleeving a damaged cylinder, the entire engine must generally be removed and taken to a shop for the repair. This renders the entire process very inconvenient and costly.
Another drawback characterizing conventional engines resides in the engines' cooling systems. Most engines use a cooling circuit in which water is drawn into a lower portion of the engine, particularly the cylinder block, and then allowed to flow along the length of the cylinder block, while a portion of the water flowing along the length of the cylinder block, and eventually, all of the water, flows upwardly through the cylinder head of the engine. Then, water flows along cooling passages formed within the cylinder head and out of the engine. A drawback of this type of cooling system resides in the fact that the coolant enters the cylinder block at a single point and exits at another single point; as a consequence, the coolant must travel a fairly long path through the engine. As a further consequence, the coolant may become quite hot and therefore unable to transfer as much heat as would be the case were the coolant to be introduced at a lower temperature and not forced to flow around the entire engine.
An engine according to the present invention solves the problems described above by providing a true modular construction for the power cylinders. In one embodiment, the cylinder carrier is itself modular. All of the present inventive engines utilize direct raw water cooling, including cooling of the engine's recirculating coolant. This superior cooling configuration is combined with individual fresh water cooling of each of the engines' cylinder assemblies. Each cylinder receives an individual flow of coolant which is flowing directly from a heat exchanger. In this manner, the present engines are ideally suited for charge air boosting to fairly high pressures, because the engines offer superior cooling capability as compared with prior art engines.